Paris, October 9th, 2014 – Les Amis de la Terre/Friends of the Earth France, in partnership with CRID (Centre de Recherche et d’Information pour le Développement/Research and Information Centre for Development) and Peuples Solidaires – ActionAid France, have launched public voting today for the Pinocchio Awards 2014.
Paris, October 9th, 2014 – Les Amis de la Terre/Friends of the Earth France, in partnership with CRID (Centre de Recherche et d’Information pour le Développement/Research and Information Centre for Development) and Peuples Solidaires – ActionAid France, have launched public voting today for the Pinocchio Awards 2014.
By highlighting specific cases of social and environmental rights violations committed by multinational companies, these awards are the opportunity to report the gap between speeches regarding “sustainable development” and the actual practices on the ground. Through the Pinocchio Awards, these organizations are fighting for a binding legal framework for multinational companies’ activities.
Les Amis de la Terre France, in partnership with CRID and Peuples Solidaires, are launching today the seventh edition of the Sustainable Development Pinocchio Awards, and opening polls at www.prix-pinocchio.org. Nine companies have been nominated in three categories [1]:
Greener than green: awarded to the company which has led the most abusive and misleading communication campaign in regard to its actual activities.
- EDF and coal in Serbia
- Pur Projet and carbon offsetting in Peru
- GDF Suez and “green bonds”
Dirty hands, full wallet: awarded to the company which has the most opaque policy at the financial level (tax evasion, corruption, etc.), in terms of lobbying or in its supply chain.
- Perenco, oil drilling secrecy in the Democratic Republic of Congo
- Samsung and child labour in China
- Lyon-Turin Ferroviaire and tunnel construction under the Alps
One for all and all for me!: awarded to the company which has the most aggressive policy in terms of appropriation, exploitation or destruction of natural resources.
- Shell and shale gas in Ukraine and Argentina
- Total and oil and gas malpractices in Nigeria
- Crédit Agricole and coal mining in the Appalachian Mountains
Juliette Renaud, Corporate Accountability Campaigner at Les Amis de la Terre France, says : “There is a growing number of voluntary approaches and codes of ethics, but, since these are not being applied through legally binding policies within France or Europe or at an
international level, multinational companies are continuing to operate with impunity, as the Pinocchio Awards illustrate. Our governments must have the courage to tackle lobby groups and properly regulate these kinds of activities in order to protect human rights and the
environment from being repeatedly attacked [2].”
According to Pascale Quivy, Director of CRID : “Less than a year before the future Objectives for Sustainable Development [3] are adopted, civil society is concerned about the increasing role given to the private market sector and, in particular, multinational companies, without any
consideration in terms of social, environmental or fiscal responsibility. The Pinocchio Awards should draw attention to these failings and persuade governments to put things right.”
Fanny Gallois, Campaign Manager at Peuples Solidaires-ActionAid France, concludes : “The Pinocchio Awards echoes back hundreds of thousands of men and women around the world who are taking action to force companies, who continue to deliberately ignore their social and
environmental responsibilities, to respect their rights. They also voice the opinions of every one of us at home refusing to be tricked by the flowery language companies use to get around the catastrophic effects their activities have in countries of production.”
Mobilization for the Pinocchio Awards will take place between October 9th and November 18th 2014, the date of the public award ceremony [4]. Bi-weekly focus will be organised to
provide more information about each case with articles and multimedia content. Local Friends of the Earth and Peuples Solidaires groups will organise regional activities.
Notes
[1] A detailed description of the Pinocchio Awards and the nine 2014 nominees is available in English, French and Spanish.
[2] A proposal for a law on “parent companies’ and client companies’ due diligence” has been introduced by four political groups but is still awaiting to be debated by the French parliament. At the international level, in June 2014, the UN Human Rights Council approved a resolution to draft a binding treaty on companies and human rights – France voted against it.
[3] As of 2015, the universal Objectives for Sustainable Development will take over the Millennium Development Goals. They will be adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2015.
[4] The Pinocchio Awards are given based on thousands of internet users’ votes across the world. The ceremony will take place on November 18th 2014 at La Java, Paris.
Follow the Pinocchio Awards and Les Amis de la Terre France updates on Twitter: @amisdelaterre
